Health Occupation Education Career Specialty Module Welcome to a career in occupational therapy

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Health Occupation EducationCareer Specialty
ModuleWelcome to a career in occupational
therapy
Beth P. Velde Ph.D., OTR/lAssociate
ProfessorDepartment of Occupational TherapyEast
Carolina University
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Sponsored by Eastern Area Health Education Center
In collaboration with Office of Generalist
Programs at East Carolina University Brody
School of Medicine and The North Carolina
Department of Public Instruction
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What is occupational therapy?

• The use of purposeful activities or
  interventions to achieve functional outcomes.
• AOTA (1993)

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Ten Ways to Define Occupational Therapy

• 1. Occupational therapy is working
  collaboratively with people to facilitate
  independence and wellness in an individual's
  life.
• 2. Occupational therapy is a "client-centered"
  approach to achieve everyday health through
  functional activities.
• 3. Occupational therapy assists people of all
  ages with disabilities to become independent in
  their daily activities.
• 4. Occupational therapy promotes health and
  well-being of individuals in society through
  participation in meaningful occupation.
• 5. Occupational therapy is the promotion of
  lifelong health and well-being to facilitate
  productive living.
• 6. Occupational therapy means improving the
  quality of life by positively affecting everyday
  activities.
• 7. Occupational therapy practitioners help
  individuals develop skills necessary to perform
  daily activities.
• 8. Occupational therapy provides the tools to
  break down barriers to an individual's
  independence.
• 9. Occupational therapy provides you with a
  balance of independence at home, at work, and at
  play.
• 10. Occupational therapy teaches "skills for the
  job of living.
• http//www.aota.org/featured/area2/links/link02g.a
  sp

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Two key words in occupational therapy.

• Occupation activities of everyday life that are
  named, organized, and given value and meaning by
  an individual and a culture. Everything a person
  does to occupy him/her self.
• Law, Polatajko, Baptiste Townsend (1997).

• Activity--a universally recognized phenomenon
  that involves materials, form and structure,
  action processes, real and symbolic meaning.
• Velde Fidler, 2002

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The difference between occupation and activity.

• Think of the activity riding a bicycle. You
  should picture a two wheeled vehicle that is
  operated by pushing your feet in a reciprocating
  motion on a set of peddles. That is an activity.
  Now, put yourself on the bicycle. You will see a
  specific bike, with a seat to accommodate your
  size. It might be a mountain bike. You see
  yourself riding it down the path at a state park.
  That is an occupation!

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Outcomes of occupational therapy interventions.

• Adaptation
• Occupational Performance
• Role Competence
• Health and wellness
• Quality of life
• Life satisfaction
• Prevention

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Adaptation

• The change you make in your response to an
  occupational challenge when your usual response
  does not work.

• Imagine that you have broken your right hand and
  you are right handed. Your favorite activity is
  surfing the internet. Adaptation describes what
  you would do to continue surfing the net by using
  the computer keyboard with your left hand.

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Occupational Performance

• The ability to do the occupations you want to do.
  This ability includes your skills and having the
  proper environmental supports. Those
  environmental supports include equipment and
  materials, money, a space, and others to play
  with.

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Role competence

• Roles include occupational roles such as
  racquetball player and lifelong roles such as
  mother, brother, cousin, and husband. To be
  competent in these roles you need to know and be
  able to perform the behaviors that your culture
  attributes to these roles.

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Health and wellness

• A state of physical, mental, emotional and
  social well-being.

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Quality of Life

• Discrepancy between ones personal attainment of
  physical well being, material well being, social
  well being, emotional well being productive
  well being and the degree of mastery and the
  norms for ones own culture.

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Prevention

• Promotion of a healthy lifestyle that allows a
  person to achieve personal quality of life. A
  lifestyle is the day to day activities that
  represent your beliefs, attitudes and values.
  These activities include your habits and the
  routines you follow--the way you organize your
  time.

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Intervention

• According to the Occupational Therapy Practice
  Framework (2002), occupational therapists work
  with clients using the following approaches.
• Create/promote
• Restore/establish
• Maintain
• Modify
• Prevent

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Create/Promote

• Using activities to increase a persons ability
  to lead a healthy lifestyle.
• Parenting classes
• Fitness classes
• Stress management
• For example, the AOTA is currently leading a
  program to promote safe and efficient use of
  backpacks in the schools.

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Restore/Establish

• Teaching a skill or ability that a person has
  lost due to a health impairment or that the
  person did not acquire during the developmental
  process.
• For example, people who experience a traumatic
  brain injury (TBI) may have trouble reading
  because they are unable to track the words left
  to right in a line. To restore that skill, an OT
  might have them practice by using a cue such as a
  pencil to trace the movement and an anchor down
  the sides of the page, such as a bold red line.

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Maintain

• Provision of supports so the person can maintain
  skills and abilities learned during the
  intervention process.
• Maintaining upper extremity strength developed
  during establish approach in order to continue
  independent wheelchair transfers.

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Prevent

• Using intervention to prevent future problems in
  persons with or without health impairments.
• Using ergonomic principles to develop an office
  station that will prevent further injury to a
  person with carpal tunnel syndrome.

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Who works in occupational therapy?

• Occupational therapists
• http//www.aota.org/featured/area2/links/link09.as
  p
• Occupational therapy assistants
• http//www.aota.org/featured/area2/links/link11.as
  p

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Where do occupational therapists and occupational
therapy assistants work?

• Hospitals
• Private clinics
• Schools
• Nursing homes
• Home health agencies
• Community organizations
• Mental health centers

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Activity

• Visit the website for the Occupational handbook
  and investigate the outlook for occupational
  therapy as a profession
• http//stats.bls.gov/oco/ocos078.htm

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What do occupational therapists and occupational
therapy assistants get paid?

• Full-time employed OTs report a median annual
  salary of 45,000 at their primary setting
  full-time OTAs report a median of 30,000.
  Part-time OTs report a median salary of 26,875
  part-time OTAs report a median of 18,928.
  Average income for full-time and part-time OTs
  has remained flat since 1997 average income for
  full-time OTAs has dropped a small amount since
  1997. Only part-time OTAs post a noticeable
  income increase since 1997. Full-time OTs report
  a median hourly wage of 23.71 for their primary
  employment setting, about the same reported in
  1997. Declines are seen in average hourly wages
  for part-time OTs and full-time OTAs. The
  strongest long-term increases are seen for
  part-time OTAs. OT average salary increases from
  a low of 37,243 for those with one year or less
  of experience to a high of 53,568 for those with
  15 or more years of experience. Average income
  peaks at 63,254 for those OTs who have a
  Doctorate.
• http//www.otjoblink.org/links/link04.asp

Working on balance at school.
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Activity

• Visit the American Occupational Therapy
  Association website and review the AOTA 2000
  Salary Survey.
• http//www.otjoblink.org/links/link04.asp

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How do I become an Occupational Therapist?

• Beginning in 2006, the entry level degree for a
  registered occupational therapist is a post
  baccalaureate degree. To find the colleges and
  universities who offer such degrees, visit the
  AOTA website.

• You will need a college degree.
• You must pass a national certification exam.
• You may need to have a state practice license.

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How do I become an occupational therapy assistant?

• You will need a community college degree.
• You will need to pass a national certification
  exam.
• You may need a state license to practice.

• Visit the AOTA website for information about
  educational programs, certification and licensure.

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What special skills and abilities do occupational
therapists learn?
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Activity Analysis

• Occupational therapists can analyze a complex
  activity to understand its structure, rules,
  environment, materials and objects, real
  symbolic meaning, and action processes. When they
  compare the analysis to a person, they are able
  to determine why the person may be having trouble
  participating in the activity and find ways to
  help.

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Assessment of Domains

• Occupational therapists know how to use
  activities to assess an individual within the
  domains of affective, motor, cognitive, and
  spiritual. In this picture the occupational
  therapist is using a leather lacing activity to
  assess the cognitive domain.

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Modify

• One way to help is to modify the activity, the
  materials used in the activity or the
  environment. In this picture, the person is using
  a special knife called a rocker knife to cut meat
  in the pan.

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Restore/Establish

• When an occupational therapist has determined
  that a person is having trouble with an activity
  because of a problem in a particular domain, s/he
  may work on strengthening the components within
  the domain. The following slides show ways the
  therapist may use assessments to determine
  problems and to identify progress.

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Testing hand strength

• Occupational therapists know how to use tools
  such as a hand dynamometer to test for hand
  strength.

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Range of Motion

• Occupational therapists know how to use a finger
  goniometer to assess the range of motion of each
  finger.

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Grip and Grasp

• Occupational therapists use a pinch meter to
  determine how much strength a person has when the
  use a pinch grasp.

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Splint

• Occupational therapists make and modify splints
  to provide support for persons who are recovering
  from a variety of injuries. This is usually used
  to prepare the person for engagement in
  occupation or to support an area of the body that
  needs protection.